Davy Powergas proposes floating chemical plants Davy Powergas has unveiled an unprecedented scheme to build chemical plants at one point and then ship them to a final destination for installation. At a press conference in New York City last week, the British engineering firm discussed its concept. In this case the company was talking about a floating methanol plant, but the firm says the concept can work with a number of different types of chemical plants. The idea behind this concept is that it may be cheaper to build a methanol plant in a developed country and ship it on a barge—which later becomes the base of the plant—to a less-developed country where, presumably, labor is not sufficiently skilled to build the plant Gulf Canada engineer checks test strip economically. during paving in Michigan Although no methanol plants have been built on barges and no contracts which up to 50% of the asphalt is re- have yet been signed to build one, placed by molten sulfur. The Gulf Davy Powergas says that the techCanada approach makes use of a nology will work. The company points specially designed blending unit that to examples of shipboard plants that Gulf calls a sulfur-asphalt module or already have been built, including SAM. The SAM automatically mixes processing facilities for oil refining, sulfur and asphalt in the proper pro- plywood manufacturing, and wood portions and at the proper tempera- pulping. ture and pumps the blend to a pug One of the plans proposed by Davy mill where it is mixed with aggregate Powergas works this way: The plant to form the paving material. is built on board the barge at a shipSulfur-asphalt conserves hydro- yard. While this is going on, the civil carbons and it provides a market for works at the plant site are being consulfur, removed in increasing structed. Included in these civil works amounts from natural gas, crude oil, are two basins, the first of which is and other fuels. For the user, Gulf deep and the second, shallow. FounCanada says, it provides road surfaces dations on which the barges eventuthat have nearly double the strength ally will be placed are built in the of conventional pavement and can shallow basin. The barges then are thus be built thinner. The roads, it shipped to the site. The seawall at the says, are also more resistant to cli- deep basin is breached, and the matic change. barges enter and are moored. The Moreover, sulfur-asphalt provides seawall then is closed and enough economies because sulfur bridging water is pumped into the basins to effects make it possible to use low- allow the barges to float over to the grade local aggregate—sand or pol- shallow basin. The water then is ished stone—rather than higher- pumped out and the barges settle on grade aggregate that would have to be their foundations. The deep basin shipped to the construction site. It is and the areas around the barges then this ability with local aggregates that are backfilled. Hookups are made to attracted the interest of the Saudi the civil works that were installed while the plant was being built and Arabians. Gulf Canada since 1974 has laid a shipped. And the plant is ready for number of test strips in Ontario, Al- startup. berta, and Michigan. One test, under Davy Powergas maintains that alway since November in Alberta, is though the initial cost of the equipbeing carried out by the Sulphur De- ment and materials going into the velopment Institute of Canada, which barge plant would be about 25% more is comparing the Gulf Canada process than for a conventional plant, by the with another called Pronk (after F. E. time a conventional methanol plant Pronk, its developer). The Pronk were built, it would cost about 19% process uses an additive to promote more in total capital costs. These dispersion of the sulfur in the asphalt figures are based on equipment and and to stabilize the asphalt. The construction costs for comparable Pronk process is also in the licensee 2200 ton-per-day plants. negotiating stage. D Production costs, excluding the 8
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cost of the feedstock, for the same plants would also be about 19% more with a conventional plant, mainly because of higher costs for maintenance, insurance, depreciation, and capital charges. D
Government to review industrial innovation The White House has established an interagency committee to conduct a comprehensive review of issues and problems related to industrial innovation. The 14-month study will be under the direction of the Secretary of Commerce and is expected to develop a number of Presidential-level options that address ways the government can assist industry in strengthening its research efforts. In announcing the new study, the White House noted that "in recent years private sector R&D has concentrated on low-risk, short-term projects directed at improving existing products. Emphasis on the longer-term research that could lead to new products and processes has decreased." As a result of these trends, White House science adviser Frank Press, who helped formulate the study, has said, "The health of our economy is being adversely affected by a lag in our productivity and decline in our industrial innovation. ,, When the White House innovation study was first proposed earlier this year, Dr. Jordan J. Baruch, assistant secretary of Commerce for science and technology, noted that "the federal government is clearly a critical actor in the innovation process." Questions about its role that need to be answered, according to Baruch, include: How do we strengthen the patent system and minimize the risk of strengthening monopolies? And how do we subsidize industrial research and not simply displace corporate funds into profits? Other members of the interagency committee besides Press and the Secretary of Commerce are the Secretaries of Energy; Defense; Health, Education & Welfare; and Treasury; the Attorney General; the administrators of the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Aeronautics & Space Administration; the directors of the National Science Foundation and the Office of Management & Budget; the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers; the assistant to the President for national security affairs; and the special trade negotiations representative. D
